AWOL

Oh woe is me - I do apologise to all those who have been bereft of reading the last 5 days, and instead had to turn to what is looking increasingly like fairly miserable news in UK papers. My only excuse is that I have just been having far too good a time! Less blogging time = more adventure time!

So, what in the name of noodles have I been getting up to since arriving in Vietnam I hear you cry! Sit down comfortably and I shall tell you.

Hong Kong - Macau - HCMC, Vietnam

Friday saw me waking at the ungodly hour of 4.30am to get my ferry across to gambling capital of Asia, Macau - a portuguese influenced tiny island of, as far as my 20 minute whiz through allowed me to see, whopping scrapers and themed casinos. Thankfully a brisk stopover. A trouble-free trip on the worryingly named 'Viva Macau' airlines, arriving into Ho Chi Minh (aka Saigon) airport no problem. HCM airport failed to participate in Airport Idols due to shambolic organisation - not even a close contender! But I eventually exited the airport, picked up my airport man (I was having none of the antics I experienced in Korea, and took every measure possible to avoid a repeat), and entered into an energetic debate with 2 English boys about what on earth the exchange rate was. I ended up a multi-millionaire, merely by extracting $125. If only it were so easy back home!

I settled into Madame Cuc's Hotel 127, went for a scout around and my first delicious bowlful of steaming pho, and got talking to a Vietnamese/French girl. This thankfully meant that she was able to hold my hand through me on my first nailbiting road crossing ordeal. This may not sound like much even to Londoners, but let me assure you that this is without doubt the most nervewracking experience of my trip so far. Traffic in HCMC is relentless, I mean NON-STOP. If you waited for a pause, you could potentially stand at the roadside like a lost child for days, if not weeks. Red lights are merely a passing gesture to road safety, completely powerless in the face of hundreds of thousands of mopeds carrying anything from 5 family members to the complete contents of a street-side restaurant, half a dozen pigs, 3 dogs or a small mountain of sticks. The only way of dealing with the onslaught is by taking the following actions:

1. take a DEEP breath, muttering some desperate prayers, and make your first step onto the street. The sooner you get on with it, the less likely you are to bottle it.
2. It is imperative that you advance slowly, make no sudden movements, and ABOVE ALL - DO NOT reverse.
3. You may: occasionally emit squeaks of terror and give up all hope. I admit, I was tempted to cover my eyes.

Sound extreme? It is. This is what is called ETC - Extreme Traffic Choreography - the fact is, all these mopeds just seem to dance around you in some kind of bizarre automobile ballet, and it seems to work. Providing you make no surprise actions, you will emerge unscathed. If all else fails, whimper and wring your hands a bit, and make several false starts, and if you are looking like you will bottle it, I have no doubt you can easily acquire yourself a willing companion for a few dong. I will attempt to upload a video to demonstrate.

A quick visit to Ben Thanh market, where I dodged the grasping mitts of fruit/t-shirt/knickknack vendors, and escaped drenched in sweat, clutching a bag of my favourite mangosteen fruit, worth every drop of perspiration emitted.

Scams'R'Us

I then experienced the first of many little Vietnamese scams for dosh, as I headed back to the airport by taxi to pick up my mate Dave. Agreeing the price (15,000 Dong - about 50p) with the taximan via calculator, I arrived only for him to say 'No, No, I meant 150'. Hm, whatever. I could still afford it, but in a way was thankful for the alert to one of the many ways that they will attempt to bungle the rich foreigner...thankfully, accompanied by Dave the Big Irish Giant (BIG from hereonin), at a well-built 6'6 I have been using him as a deterrent against the many little b*****s trying to relieve us of our dosh. If they start to get nasty, he just puffs up and looks scary and they back down. I should've got myself a guarddog, I mean travel companion ages ago!

Our first evening was spent tucking into a pile of spring roll, some more pho, and some fresh fruit juice, and stopping by an artfully placed coffee shop to watch the moped world go by, before getting hopelessly lost in amongst a web of pure Vietnamese bunks near our hotel (we eventually gave in and got a taxi to take us the 50 metres it actually was to our hotel).

One Day in Ho Chi Minh City

Here's how not to do it.

Rise scandalously early at 6am with the buzzing of HCM's endless moped soundtrack still ringing in your ears, wait three hours for your travel buddy to hop to it.

And here's how you should do it. Dave and I are agreed, we played it perfectly - with equal doses of seeing the sights and relaxing with a (cracking) coffee whilst people-watching. So when I finally gave in and knocked on Big's door, we headed out for a noodley breakfast, and the obligatory backpacker's fare of banana pancakes - fuel which was very much required for our marathon city visit.

First, a whip round of Ben Thanh's market, then a potter along the banks of the Saigon river, batting off offers of guides, tours, boat-trips and cyclos. A turn of the HCM Botanical gardens and zoo, where we saw (in typical fairly squalid Asian-zoo style conditions) a hippo, elephants, orangutang, tigers, monkeys...oh and the first of MANY a rat - this was an unintended addition to the wildlife viewing. Down to Reunification palace, and along to a bunch of fairly glitzy apartments, where, just for interest, we went in as prospective buyers. Not insubstantial prices...

A cyclo ride back to the river, where we again overcame scam-maestros who tried to charge us 10 times what we had agreed. At one stage my little driver started to get really quite nasty, but I was determined to stand our ground. I wasn't being fooled this time! One battle over, we headed into another, bargaining for an hour's boat trip down the river, which involved a very pleasant little sunset putter into the highways and byways the other side of HCM's major river, which very quickly descents into swamp-like territory. A rather amusing incident with a local toilet which can only be captured on camera - I will try to upload another video which Dave took where, much to his, and an audience of about 10's amusement, I tried (and failed) to 'go local'. Ahem. Watch video to be amused at my utter mortification. Still, an otherwise eventless pleasant river cruise, and bed following a late night juice. I am in fruit bat heaven.

Voyage to Mui Ne

So long farewell to the neverending noctural noise of the ciddee, and off to beach paradise. But wait! An adventure MUST be on the cards by now in the blog no? Yes indeedy, I wouldn't want to disappoint! Dave and I crammed our mutually lengthy limbs into the tiny wee bus seats (apologies if I go all Irish, I think it's catching), Dave expressing extreme dismay at the teensy Vietnamese lady and her dog in front who insisted on ramming her seat back quite as far as it would stretch, and proceeded to natter our way through a 5 hour coach journey up the coast, occasionally stopping to gasp as the coach careered past teetering mopeds piled with animals/vegetables/minerals with less than an inch to spare, or overtook lorries headlong into other vehicles forcing them off the road. We're both fairly chilled types, but I think we're in firm agreement that the journey aged us more than desired.

Stopping apparently for a break, worse was yet to come, as our (chronic) driver nearly wiped out another coachload of people. We parked up, and then the whole coach saw the other driver crash onboard in a whirlwind of rage and screams, brandishing a chopstick (?!), and walloping our driver in the head. It soon got completely out of hand with an out-and-out brawl which, given Dave and I were 4 seats from the front, was hairraising to say the least. Not helped by the fact that all the screams and shouts were in a language which for all we knew could have been saying 'I'm going to gut all your foreign passengers!'. Thankfully he was hauled off punching and kicking, and we cracked into a bunch of rambutans to abate our stress levels. Who said backpacking was relaxing?!?!

Still, we arrived in Mui Ne, a lovely quiet beachside resort, with no further disruptions, and were dumped conveniently right on the doorstep of the hotel we had handpicked from our lonely planet. Beautiful. A hop, skip and a jump into the sea, followed by a 10 metre jaunt along the beach to a restaurant. Nice. Or, as my jolly Irish companion would say "'Appy Days". And we pretty much didn't venture outside of an 100 metre stretch along Mui Ne beach for about 3 days...our days pretty much panned out thus:

• wake (varying according to whether you are early bird Lex (6am) or late lazy Irishboy (Dave)
• walk/run along beach, hit sea to wake up
• breakfast in Lang Tam cafe (no kidding, we loved this place so much and had such a varied choice of dishes, we actually didn't go anywhere else the whole time)
• sunbathe/swim/sea kayak
• lunch in Lang Tam cafe
• maybe venture across road for a massage
• lie in sun, battle sea waves
• dinner in Lang Tam cafe (see, I wasn't kidding ya)
• buy some beers/cold drinks, sit on empty beach revelling in the bliss of beachside peace and quiet

Yesterday, however, we jolted ourselves out of the blissful routine that I suddenly realised had passed two days rather unexpectedly, and we branched out of our 100 metre stretch to, gasp, walk a little further along the road. On our saunter, we proved that we were indeed in the 'hub' of this quiet little town, and that our restaurant was the 'liveliest', and with its perfect beach view, what more could be desired?! We hired a moped, and made the most of the quiet roads to zoom along the coast to the fishing village, looking a little like a misfit Wallace and Gromit, with Dave's curly hair bobbing merrily away under his hat, and me sitting merrily on the back, singing 'poop poop!' a la Toad (ref: Wind in the Willows). It was BRILLIANT! In the fishing village, we stopped for a brief iced coffee, and were once again away. Wooooo hooooooo!!!!

And there endeth a summary of my first 4-5 days in Vietnam. Some social observations and witticisims will follow at some stage, but given how much I have struggled to get t'internet working in these sweaty little cafes, I think I will just end my blog with my diligent food update, and continue at a later stage. A tootle heure!

Food Fiend

• Pho - a delicious, nourishing Vietnamese soup, with steaming broth poured over light rice noodles and a variety of meat (chicken, beef, pork), and into which you heap a whopping handful of beansprouts, sweet basil, lettuce, lime juice, fish sauce. Truly the perfect all-round meal, and many a bowl eaten for many a meal
• Spring rolls - ah the luscious crispiness of the wondrous roll, whether it be fish, prawn, chicken or pork, these little rolls of delight never fail to satisfy
• Deep Fried Snails - um. Yes. This was one of Dave's ideas, and we quickly learnt that Dave's food suggestions are, shall we say, not one of his finest qualities...he's sticking to dealing with our money. One line: deep fried bubble gum. We gave the plate to a passing beggar (who also, let it be said, made sharp work of the bottle of beer I donated to him...)
• Fish steamed with Ginger - ohhhh heaven. Made up for the tremendous error of the snails (let's not bring those up again), with the tender flesh simply falling off the bones, melting into my little pot of rice, and accompanied beautifully by...
• Morning Glory - a great pile of steaming veg with garlic
• Steamed Crab - we really went to town on this at 1.30 a pop...
• Roast Mussels with spring onions
• Steamed prawns with coconut juice (dipped in a white pepper and lime mixture which is quite unbelievable)
• Prawns with tamarind - a tart, sugary sauce
• Banana pancakes (well - we are 'backpackers' now)
• Banana/mango/pineapple/watermelon/Strawberry & Custard Apple younameitIwilltryit Shakes...
• Oh Heavenly Fruit - mangosteen, mangoes, custard apples, rambutans, lychees, bananas, Dragon fruit, papaya